Mr. Speaker, in my view, the reason why the government is interfering in areas under provincial jurisdiction is very simple--to increase the visibility of the federal government, Canada. It is interfering in our areas of jurisdiction and telling Quebeckers that Canada is there to help them. This is nothing more than a trick because nowadays Quebec is capable of meeting all its own needs. The federal government is duplicating Quebec's areas of jurisdiction in order to interfere and to take over from Quebec's programs. This duplication serves no useful purpose and just confuses people. People are calling us to say that they are faced with two programs, one provincial and one federal and want to know which one they should choose. These programs are often split in two and they have to apply to both to receive a fair amount.
I want to go back to the issue of transfers and fiscal imbalance. The federal government must absolutely transfer to Quebec the money that is owed to us, because we are the only province that can meet its own needs, that knows exactly what is going on in the field and in these organizations. This must also be done to avoid a useless bureaucracy. Having another department, another program, means that non-profit organizations, which often have limited resources, will have to do more paperwork. Their resources are often volunteers. They spend time filling out all these forms, but this takes a lot of the time that they should spend to do the important things for which they are there. It is important that the federal government transfer these funds to the provinces.
I also want to talk about the federal government's claim that it never has any money to meet our needs. However, when it wants to put the word “Canada” everywhere, it does find money to do so. In my riding, the workers affected by the loss of 1,000 jobs in six Huntingdon plants are asking for a program for older worker adjustment. It is estimated that, for all of Canada, such a program might cost at the most $50 million. The government is telling us that it does not have any money to help textile workers. In 1997, that program only cost $26 million.
Instead of creating all sorts of new departments, why does the government not follow up on these requests, which would definitely help people in the field?